The Lycanthro Stone
by dragondrewversion2
Summary: Lara finds a stone in an unknown temple, and after she does she experiances incredible changes.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer:I don't own Tomb Raider.

Synopsis:Lara finds an ancient stone of great power, the Lycanthro Stone. After she finds it though, she starts experiencing certain changes.

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Lara Croft and the gift of the Lycanthro Stone

_Some say they don't exist, some say they do, but whoever is right one thing is certain: Werwolves are marvelous creatures. However, humans of ancient times didn't agree, infact they believed them to be the work of demons. A great war raged between humans and werewolves for years until the humans sought the help of their shamans to destroy them. Unfortunately, they had taken a secret oath to never completely destroy any creature man, beast, or both. They developed a spell which they said would destroy them all, but what the people didn't know was that the shamans also created a stone which if touched under the light of a full moon, would grant them the gift of lycanthropy. When they discovered the shamans' secret plot, they killed them and attempted to destroy the stone, but found that they were unable to even scratch it. So they built a temple to house the stone to make sure no one would suffer from what they called they called the "Curse of the Loup Garou". Ever since then, no one had ever laid eyes on the stone again._

"Zip, have you gotten any information on this temple yet?" Lara asked over her com-link while trying to make out any writing on the walls. Lara had recently discovered this temple during her trip to Peru and wanted to see if she could get any sort of legend that may be associated with it.

"No, not yet. Every database I've checked haven't turned up anything about it. I'll keep looking." Zip replied. Zip is what some would call a computer geek, but he's actually pretty cool. He's Laras right hand man and one of her most trusted friends.

"I don't feel comfortable about this place Lara, it doesn't seem to be devoted to a god and you can't make out who built it. Maybe we'd better leave this place be." Alistair warned over the radio. He may be a worry wart, but he's also intelligent and very loyal to his friends.

"Don't worry Alistair, I'll be fine. I've been in situations like this hundreds of times before. All I have to do is find the main chamber, there's bound to be some sort of evidence as to who built this place there." She entered a hallway and immediatly smelled a boobie trap. She kicked a small rock onto the floor ahead of her and as she expected, a bunch of darts shot out of the walls. She chuckled at how easy these were spotted. She noticed the rock hit a certain design that was repeated on the floor, so she made sure to step in between them until she finally made it to the other side.

"Much too easy." She declared. Just as she was about to proceed, the floor literally came out from under her revealing a chasm filled with spikes. She was barely able to grab the edge it all happened so quick. She pulled herself back up and examened the floor. Not only were there spikes, but there were also spinning blades, spinning poles with spikes and a section that look incredibly deep.

"What is in this temple that's so important, they were willing to go to this much trouble to keep it safe?" She asked Zip over the radio.

"Don't ask me. Just try not to get impaled OK." Zip said warningly.

"I wasn't planning on it." She replied sarcasticly. She surveyed the hallway, or what was left of it, and found a spot on the ceiling she could grapple onto. She jumped over the chasm and grappled the spot and swung to the other side. The end of the hallway there was a door with carvings of what looked like humans with a dogs heads. Undetered by this, she searched for a way to open the door. After about a minute, she found a brick on the door that looked a little loose.

"Bingo!" She declared as she pushed the brick in the door. A low rumbling could be heard as the door lifted from the floor and disappeared into the ceiling. She looked into the room and saw only one thing, a padestal in the middle of the room with what looked like a ruby on it. Lara approached the middle of the room and was astonished at how beautiful the ruby looked in the moonlight that was shining through a hole in the ceiling. She could already tell that it was rigged and it would be dangerous to just take the stone off. She searched the room and found a rock that looked about the same size as the ruby. She approached the pedestal again and prepared to substitute the rock for the ruby. She slowly moved her hand towards the ruby and then her hand met with the ruby. Suddenly, Lara felt an incredible sensation coming from the stone, but it wasn't painful, it was actually pleasant. She felt as if something was being changed inside of her, but she couldn't tell what. She looked through the hole in the ceiling and saw the moon. At that moment, she felt the moon was the most beautiful sight she had ever seen. Then, as fast as it had begun, the sensation vanished and caused her to knock the stone off the pedestal. As she had suspected, the room began to shake and bricks and stones began to fall from the ceiling. She recovered from her little spell and realized what was happening around her. She noticed the ruby was still intact and not wanting to nearly black out again, she picked it up with a piece of cloth she had and made for a hole in the wall made by the collapse. It led to another boobie trapped hallway, but the collapsing temple had rendered them useless, so she paid them no mind. But one of the dart traps still partially worked and a dart left a huge gash in her back. She screamed in pain, but kept going and evetually found an exit. She hid behind a large rock as the entire temple collapsed to the ground leaving nothing but a large field of rock. She got up from her protective spot and viewed the wreakage. She felt bad that the temple was lost, but was just glad she was alive and that she was able to at least save an artifact before it was lost forever. She didn't notice that through all the excitement, she lost the cloth and was now holding the stone with her bare hand, but she didn't feel the sensation she felt earlier.

"Lara, are you there?!?" Zip shouted over the com-link which she dropped behind the rock. Lara picked it up and replied, "Yes, I'm fine, and I was able to save an artifact before the temple collapsed."

"Are you mad?! You could have died!" Alistair shouted. "Please Alistair, I'm alright, no need to lose your head. I'm going to need a ride Zip."

"Got one set up, I've got a lock on your coordinates and they're gonna be there in a few minutes."

"Thank you, and call the museum and tell them I have a new piece for them."

"Got it, see you in a few hours." Zip then turned off the com-link and Lara walked toward the meeting point Zip had downloaded to her PDA. As she walked, she didn't notice that the back of her shirt was torn, but there was no wound on the other side.

Thank you for reading the first chapter and expect another one in a day or so. Review I beg of you.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2:First signs

_Night. The most beautiful time of all. She strolls through the forest taking in the smell of the trees and the sounds of the crickets chirping. Then she saw the moon and stared. The most spectacular part of the night. The way it shines in the night would the sun envyous. She eventually lowers her eyes to the creek a few feet away. She feels a little thirsty, so she bends down and takes a palmful of water into her mouth. She looks into the water expecting to see her face, but instead sees the face of a wolf!_

Lara shot up screaming from the shock of what started out as a pleasant dream. She breathed heavily as she felt her face and sighed with relief as it was normal. She laughed at herself for believing what was obviously a dream. She got out of bed, and walked over to her closet. She decided to go with her usual brown crop up and khaki shorts. She suddenly remembered the injury she sustained last night and felt her back to see how bad it was, but there was no scar. She figured she must have just imagined it and quickly stopped worrying about it. When she got out of the closet, she could very plainly smell eggs, bacon, and waffles from downstairs. She wondered how she could seeing as how the kitchen was all the way downstairs, but she quickly forgot about it and headed down to the dining room. When she got there, Zip and Alister were already starting breakfast.

" Well look who's up, did you have a nice nap?" Zip said as he sipped on his coffee.

" Why yes I did, and I see you started breakfast without me." Lara quipped as she took her normal place at the table.

" Well if we waited for you we'd have starved by the time you got down." Remarked Alister.

" Very funny, have you started examining the artifact I found last night yet?" Lara asked while she anticipated the breakfast that Winston was preparing.

" No not yet, but from what I can tell it must've been very important to whoever built that temple, because it was very well protected." Alister replied as Winston came in from the kitchen. All of the sudden, Lara became extremely hungry when she saw the bacon and eggs and immediately began to dig in. Her friends had never seen her eat so viciously before and began to get a little disturbed by it.

" Whoa, whoa Lara slow down. I've never seen you so hungry before, have you been eating enough lately?" Zip inquired. Lara finally realized what she was doing and slowed down a bit.

" Sorry about that, it's just that I haven't eaten since last night." She then slowed down to her normal pace of eating. " Anyway, what have I got on the agenda today Winston?"

" Well you do have the gala at the museum tonight." Winston replied knowing that she wouldn't be happy about it. Lara and hated these corporate parties, and because they're always filled with rich idiots with no knowledge of anything that doesn't have to do with money. Although, the curator of the museum is a good friend of hers, so it would be rude for her to turn down the invitation, and she had a new dress she wanted to try on.

" Alright then, call Mr. Dumonds and tell him I will be attending. Also, tell him that I will be donating a new piece to the museum." Winston bowed in compliance in proceeded to the telephone. Lara then began to smell something very strong in the air and noticed it was coming from Alister. " Alister, I don't know what kind of aftershave you're using, but you're coming over rather strongly."

" I did and use that much, in fact I ran out today so I could and use the usual amount I do." Alister replied.

" Yeah Lara, I'm sitting right next to him and I can't smell anything." Zip added.

" Oh, must have been my imagination. Anyway, Zip, keep going through our sources to try to find out who built that temple and Alister, keep studying the artifact, perhaps it will provide some answers." Lara said as she got up and made her way to the gym, but not before grabbing a few more pieces of bacon.

Well that's chapter 2, please review. Sorry I didn't mean that to rhyme.


	3. Chapter 3:Wolf in Womans clothing

Chapter 3:Wolf in Womans' clothing.

Lara's Gym

Ever since she was around 13 years old, Lara would work out in her gym to keep her in top physical form. She has everything she needs in that room from weight sets to a climbing wall and even some things that were inspired by traps she discovered in the tombs she had visited over the years. Her strength level had always stayed at a normal level throughout her life, but today something was off. When she went to lift her usual peak weight of 147 lbs., she found that it was far easier than usual.

"That's odd." She declared in her head as she decided to experiment. She added 10 lbs. to the dumbells and attempted to lift it and did so with little trouble. She did so 2 more times until she found that she now could lift up to 173 lbs. Of course this was probably the result of all the extra activity lately. Since she discovered that her mother was not dead, but instead was on Avalon, she had been running around the world looking for answers, but had so far run short. At the present time however she had other things to worry about. The gala she had to attend tonight was playing havoc on her nerves. If it weren't for the fact that the museum curator was a close friend, she wouldn't even consider going. Although she did have this beautiful new dress she wanted to try out, so tonight was as good a night as any. She would have to deal with men staring at her as usual, but after a few years of it, she had gotten used to it, it's not her fault that she was blessed with a good body. Just then, her phone rang, so of course she answered it.

"Lara Croft." She stated to make it was a right number.

"Good afternoon Ms. Croft."

"Hello Mr. Dumonds. How are you?"

"Very well indeed. Winston called with the good news that you would be attending the fundraiser gala tonight, thank you." He said with his usual glee.

"No problem at all, just make sure to put me in the wing away from the stuck-up section." She said in a sarcastic tone.

"Of course, I want you to be as comfortable as possible. So Winston tells me that you plan to add yet another piece to the museum, yes?"

"Yes, a beautiful ruby I found in a temple near Peru. Alister is still decifering it's origin, but as soon as he does, we'll send it right over."

"Jolly good. Well, I'll see you at the gala tonight."

"Alright then, goodbye." With that, Lara hung up the phone headed to her room to change for the party.

30 minutes later...

"Perfect." Lara said as she inspected herself in the mirror. The dress she was wearing was a black, backless number that came up to her knees with a slightly low cut collar. She wouldn't usually wear her hair down, but parties were the exception in that she felt looked a lot better in dresses with her hair down.

"Lady Croft, your car is waiting." Winston said as he prepared to drive her to the museum.

"Thank you Winston, I'll be down shortly." She said trying to put off the inevitable.

"You look radiant Lara, your mother would be proud of you." Winston said which made Lara feel as though he were a second father to her. He barely ever called her by her first name, simply because he was her butler. But on occasion, he would switch from butler mode to friend mode either when Lara was upset or when he was very happy for her.

"Again, thank you Winston, you look nice too."

"Ahem, I'll be waiting downstairs for you Lady Croft." Winston went out the door and Lara was left with her thoughts. That comment about her mother brought back the memory of the day she disappeared. The stone dais, the sword, the stone pillars, it had all been a mystery to her until the day she took Excaliber to the stone dais in Bolivia and found out what had really happened to her mother. She finally snapped back to reality and headed downstairs to the car. Memories would have to wait, she had a party to go to.

The museum...

"Ah Lara, thank you for coming. I know how much you hate these rich engagements." Mr Dumonds said as he sipped on his drink.

"Your welcome, just don't expect me to be too friendly with the other guests." Lara exclaimed with a joking tone.

"Of course not. To tell you the truth, I could do without them too, but the museum needs their money to keep from going bankrupt so I need to be nice. But enough of business, how have you been?"

"Fair I guess, I recently discovered that ruby I was telling you about."

"Oh yes, the ruby. Does your friend Alister know anything yet?"

"No, not yet, but by the looks of it, it should bring you an awful lot of publicity, it's the most beautiful ruby I've ever seen." She said as she imagined the way it looked when the moon shined on it the night before. How good she felt when she touched it. She then felt a slight pain in her stomach. It passed as quickly as it came. _It must have been from the tons of food I ate this morning. _She quickly pushed the thought out of her head as she saw Mr. Dumonds notice.

"Are you alright Lara, you look ill."

"Yes I'm fine, just a slight pain. So what were we talking about?"

"We were discussing the- Oh! Sorry Lara, Mr. Eidos is waving for me to come over, and you know how impatient he can be. We'll discuss this later on." He said as he walked over to the extremely rich Mr. Eidos. Lara had heard of him before, he's an entrepreneuer who got rich off of selling rare artifacts, some of which made archeological history. She dispised people who only searched for artifacts for a quick pound. She ignored him and started strolling through the many wings of the museum. She entered the hall of North American animals and admired the creatures who were displayed. She hated the fact that some of the animals were killed to be put on display, but at least most of them died due to natural causes. She then stopped when she noticed one of the wolves they had on display. It was in an idle pose just staring off into space, but it still looked beautiful. She had seen wolves many times, and sometimes unfortunately, she was forced to kill them to stay alive like when she went to Vilcabamba to search for the first piece of the Atlantian Scion. But she had never really noticed how majestic and beautiful they could be. She stared into it's eyes where she could barely make out the reflection of the moon as it shined down light through the window. She turned around and looked up through the sky light and again stared at the moon. Her mind went blank again as she was lost in the moons bright light. It was even more beautiful now than the other night in Peru. She soaked up the rays of light as the moon eradiated them. Just as she was about to snap out of it, she felt another pain in her stomach, only this time it was much worse. She doubled over in pain as she fought to hold back her scream of pain. She looked around and saw the ladies room not too far away. She hurried to the bathroom and ran into one of the stalls. She hunched over the toilet and threw up furiously. She had never felt so sick in her life, it obviously wasn't the food that was causing this. She walked out of the stall and splashed some cool water in her face. She looked at herself in the mirror and was about to leave when she caught a glance at something that just didn't look right. She closely examined her eyes and was shocked to see that their color had changed from their normal brown color to a strange sort of hazel. She then began to notice that her hair was longer than usual, but not just the hair on her head, she was now sprouting tiny hairs all over her body. She screamed as she noticed them spreading and growing slightly longer with each second. Her dress suddenly began to get tighter as she noticed her body start to grow. Her muscles surged with power they strained and tore the dress. She felt a slight pain in the tips of her fingers, when she looked at she saw the tips bulging as her fingernails were replaced with black, razor sharp claws.

"WHAT'S HAPPENING TO ME!" she screamed as she felt her feet changing to a digitigrade form. They tore through her high heels as claws formed on her toes and ripped through the material. Her thoughts switched over to a pressure in her lower back as a small nub formed above her rear. It slowly stretched out longer to form a tail. For the first time in her life she was well and truly terrified, she was turning into some type of monster and there was nothing she could do about it. Try as she might to hold back the transformation, it only made the pain much worse. She then lost her balance and fell down on all fours, where her claws scrapped the tile. She tasted something strange in her mouth, when she opened her mouth to check for the reason, a drop of blood dripped out. At first, she thought she was starting to cough up blood, but when she looked in the mirror she saw the reason, her teeth were growing larger and sharper, which was tearing her gums. She tried to scream, but all that came out was a strange animal like whine. After a few minutes, her dress had finally given up the fight as her body outgrew it. New muscles grew within her, her arms surged with newfound strength, her stomach became rock hard as her abs grew into a well defined six pack and her pectoral muscles surged causing already ample breasts to grow even larger. She felt a painful pressure within her jaw as it started to enlongate into a short mussle and her nose reshaped into that of an wolves'. Her ears then shifted from their normal position on the sides of her head to near the top of her head and then reshaped themselves into a more canine shape. As the final changes took place, the fur all over her body grew longer and covered almost every inch of her naked body. She reared her head back and with one final jolt of energy she howled to the heavens. She went back down to the ground, breathing hard from the exhaustion after all that had just transpired. She attempted to push herself back onto her feet, but met a little resistance as she was a little off balance. She balanced herself on one of the sinks in front of the mirror and gasped in shock as she looked face to face with the same wolf she saw in her dream. She stared at herself in the mirror and uttered the only phrase she was thinking of at the time.

"Oh my god!"

Sorry for the long wait, but hey, what can you do? Please review.


	4. Chapter 4:Secrets

Chapter 4: Secrets

"Oh my God. This must be a dream, an illusion of some sort." But it wasn't, the face staring back at Lara from the mirror was genuine. A wolf's face, with a small glint of humanity in its configuration. Lara raised her hand up to her mouth, only to find a strange sort of paw in its place. It was shaped like a human hand, but was covered in fur and had pads on the fingers and palm. What shocked her most, though, were the menacing claws that accompanied each fingertip. She stepped back from the mirror and fell back on the floor. A sharpshooting pain rocked her as she realized that she had landed on something foreign to her, a tail. Now officially scared stiff, Lara slowly raised herself to her newly configured feet.

"Excuse me, is anyone in there? We heard screaming!"She heard someone yell from the other side of the locked bathroom door.

_Oh no! I can't let anyone see me like this!_ She screamed in her head as she picked up and threw away the remnants of her new dress, so as to leave no evidence, and then felt a sort of secondary instinct kick in. She ran towards a vent on the ceiling clumsily, tore the cover off, and began to crawl through the ventilation system just as the group outside managed to break the door down.

"Are you sure you heard someone in here?" Mr. Dumonds asked the man.

"Of course I'm sure. It sounded like someone was being tortured in here!"

"Well I don't see anyone, so everyone can just calm down and go back to the party." Mr. Dumonds reassured as everyone cleared the bathroom. After they were gone, he turned his attention to what appeared to be a torn off vent cover and looked up to see the open shaft on the ceiling. "I knew Lara didn't want to be here, but I didn't think she would be that desperate."

The forest, 2 miles from Croft Manor

Lara was running like she never had before, at speeds that she didn't realize she was going. She began to slow as the situation she was in began to hit her again. She was a monster, a hideous creature straight from a horror movie. She couldn't go back home, not like this.

_I want to be me again, not this hideous thing! _She buried her lupine face in her hands and cried softly, but soon stopped when she felt the cold breeze on her skin. She looked at her hands and laughed gleefully at the discovery that they were normal again. She then felt her face, also finding it back to normal. She got up and made her way back to Croft Manor, which now seemed like an eternity away.

Morning, Lara's Bedroom

Lara slowly opened her eyes to find herself in her room. Though her memories of the night before were blurry, possibly from her exhaustion, she made out a few bits and pieces, including her transformation. She giggled at herself, considering it another weird dream, until she looked under the covers.

_Good Lord! _She was nude, something she would never ordinarily be, especially when asleep, which meant... "It was real. It was all real. I really became a....a...." Before she could finish that statement, she heard Winston's voice on the other side of the door.

"Lady Croft, are you in there?" She immediately ran into her closet and threw on some clothes. Winston slowly entered the room. "Lady Croft!"

"I'm in here Winston!"

"Oh thank goodness. We've been worried sick. When you didn't call for me to come get you we'd thought something had happened to you."

"Well I....just decided that I'd had enough of the gala and decided to come back. I apologize for not telling you I was home but I was so exhausted that I just fell asleep." She lied as she walked out of her closet with a basic t-shirt and sweatpants on.

"That's a new look for you Lady Croft." She knew that Winston was suspicious, so she decided to change the subject.

"Again, I'm sorry for not informing you of my plans. I didn't mean to make you worry."

"No apology needed, now if you'll excuse me, I must prepare breakfast." With that, he left, closing the door behind him. Lara mentally slapped herself for lying to him. She hated lying, but no one could ever find out what happened. She walked over to the mirror and surveyed herself. Though the clothes she was in weren't very flattering, she saw that everything else was in order. Millions of questions still rocked her mind. How did this happen? Why did it happen? Why did she become a monster. Her mind flashed back to the reflection she saw last night, realizing that although she looked remarkably different than usual, she could still somehow tell that it was her face and that it didn't exactly look freakish or horrifying, in fact she classified it as a sort of exotic sort of beauty. She snapped out of that thought after hearing Alister yell for her from downstairs. She decided to change her clothes to something a little more 'her' so the boys wouldn't get too suspicious.

When she got down the stairs, she saw Zip and Alister in the computer area. Alister motioned for Lara to come look at something.

"You found something?"

"Indeed I did. The ruins you found the stone in may have been built by a previously believed mythical tribe known as the Jolegayans. Legend says that the tribe was extremely small but immensely brutal military strategists. Some even attribute them to the disappearance of the inhabitants of Machu Picchu."

"I've never heard of them before."

"That's because barely anything is known about them. The only known artifacts that hint at their existence is an ancient parchment with a description of a Jolegayan military formation and the stone you found."

"What exactly is the stone?"

"From what I can get, the stone supposedly holds some sort of mystical meaning to them. Though it doesn't say exactly what, it does say that after building the temple to house it, they killed the ones that designed it so no one could ever get to the stone."

_I wonder if....NO, it couldn't be!_ "Are you sure it doesn't say what exactly the stone is?"

"I'm afraid so, though it must have scared them quite a bit to go to such lengths to keep it hidden."

_Of course! This all started after I touched the stone. That strange sensation, staring at the moon. I felt the same sort of awe while staring at the moon at the gala last night. It must be the stone. Which means....._

"Alister, do you mind if I take the stone. I'd like to do a little 'examining' of my own."

"Of course, but be careful with it. You wouldn't want to break it."

_Actually......._

Lara's Bedroom

Closing the door to her room behind her, she glared at the stone in her hand, intent on solving her problem. She grabbed one of her climbing picks from her equipment closet and set the stone on a table. She brought her hand up, pick in hand, ready to destroy the accursed object, but she couldn't bring her hand back down to do it. It just quivered there, like the hand was unwilling to harm the stone. Then she felt the pain from last night, only this time solely concentrated in her hand. She looked up to find that her hand had changed into the hand she saw in front of her face the night before. She dropped the pick and her hand quickly changed back to normal. She did have to admit that while it did hurt, it didn't hurt quite as badly as last time. She looked back at the stone, knowing now more than ever that it was the cause of her problem. But before she could do anything else, she got a call from downstairs.

"YO LARA, I just got a call from the Smithsonian, they want you to retrieve something for them in Siberia!"

_Oh wonderful, exactly what I need. _Taking a final glance at the stone, she walked over to her closet and prepared for her expedition to Siberia. As she closed the door, a faint glow emanated from the stone.

Finally got an update in. Sorry for the delay and I hope you enjoy. Review also, if you would be so kind.


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